Bass of the Week: Ergon Guitars Cintra

Instrument builders always bring their best gear to the NAMM Show. As we were wandering the halls of the Anaheim Convention Center we found the Boutique Guitar Showcase, which brings builders from around the world to show off their work. We saw tons of great instruments, including the jaw-dropping Cintra bass from Portugal’s Ergon Guitars.

Luthier Adriano Sérgio was on hand to let us check out the bass, which features some deep contours for a comfortable fit. He crafted the bass with a one-piece, quartersawn, roasted flame maple neck with a beautiful dovetail slide-in joint. The body is fully hand-carved with two pieces of bookmatched flame maple for the back and a one-piece of swamp ash top. Besides nice contours on the horns, the back of the bass has an almost bowl-shaped carve. Its fingerboard is ebony that has Luminlay glow-in-the-dark side dot inlays. To make it an even easier player, Sérgio gave the neck a compound radius from 9.5″ at the 0 fret to 12″ at the 23rd fret.

The pickups are a set of SB “Seteais” custom pickups with carved Mozambique blackwood covers. Their control configuration includes a volume knob for each pickup plus a master tone. The Cintra is finished off with a Babicz FCH-1 bridge, Hipshot Ultralite tuners, and a nutshell Tuf oil and wax finish. It weighs in at 8 pounds.

Check out its tone with this quick demo video Ergon made while the bass was being finished:

Ergon Guitars Cintra Bass Specs:

Construction:

Dovetail Slide-In Set-Thru Neck

Scale:

34″

Body:

Flame Maple

Top:

Swamp Ash

Neck:

1-piece Quartersawn Roasted Flamed Maple

Fingerboard:

Ebony

Fingerboard Radius:

Compoud radius from 9.5″ at the 0 fret to 12″ at the 23rd fret

Inlays:

Dot inlays, Luminlay Side Dots

Frets:

23 Jescar Evo Gold medium frets plus zero fret

Pickups:

SB “Seteais” custom pickups

Pickup Covers:

Carved Mozambique Blackwood

Controls:

Bourns pots, 3 Volumes and 1 Tone

Bridge:

Babicz FCH-1 Solo Rail saddles

Tuners:

Hipshot HB6 Ultralite

Finish:

Nutshell Tuf Oil and Wax

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